Career Counseling at KHYS

Are you new at KIT and are looking for orientation regarding the offers, services, and funding opportunities available to you during your postdoc phase? Are you wondering how you can best use the coming years at KIT for the next career step in addition to your research activities? Then book an appointment with us! We will give you a comprehensive overview of the offers, services, and contacts at KIT.

Prerequisite: ▶ registered member of KHYS

Contact: ▶ Jana Schmitt

Would you like to systematically expand your skills, hone your career profile and are you looking for the best possible qualification offers currently available? Perhaps you have just successfully completed a milestone in your research project and are finding that your career planning has been somewhat overlooked? Or maybe you have already decided that you will leave academia – but how do you find a follow-up position in a company and what do you need to consider when applying?

This counseling service can be used for a variety of individual reasons and is designed to provide a focused initial impulse for the next concrete step in the direction you are planning. Simply book an appointment. We would be happy to assist you in giving your career planning new impetus.

Prerequisite: ▶ registered member of KHYS

Contact: ▶ Jana Schmitt

No matter where you are: At the beginning of your time as a postdoc at KIT, in the middle of your postdoc phase or you already have the end of your research time at KIT in mind: This counseling service is aimed at all KIT postdocs who are looking for orientation, clarification, or changes and who would like to take a closer look at their current professional situation. The following questions and contents may be covered in the consultations:

• Which qualifications and competences do I need for the next career step in science?
• How do I make a decision on a concrete career goal? What do I need to do in order to pursue a specific career path?
• Is a professorship really the right career goal for me?
• What are the alternatives if I do not want to pursue a scientific career? What are opportunities for me outside of university?
• How do I manage to keep a better overview of my own (career) goals and set myself apart? How can I better balance professional requirements, family obligations and personal needs?
• and much more...

Take the opportunity to address your questions in the consultation appointments, allowing them more time and space. We would be happy to assist you in making decisions and setting goals for your future successful career.

Prerequisite: ▶ registered member of KHYS

Contact: ▶ Jana Schmitt

Career coaching offers you as a postdoc at KIT the opportunity to work on individual concerns and challenges in the career context with external coaches of your choice. The aim of the coaching is to help you better clarify, plan and implement your current and future academic or non-academic career and to support you in finding your own solutions.

Coaching occasions for individual career coaching can relate to topics such as

• Clarifying and strengthening professional identity (gaining clarity about personal professional goals, decision-making, career strategy planning, visibility, career change, role clarity, self-presentation, appointment coaching)

• Strengthening leadership skills (clarifying leadership role, leadership style and self-concept as a leader)

• Compatibility of family and career, work-life balance, managing conflict and stress

Scope of Funding

KHYS funds individual career coaching sessions by covering the costs of one-to-one coaching with a professionally trained external coach of your choice up to a maximum total amount of EUR 650 plus any applicable VAT per person receiving funding. Only fee costs for the honorarium are funded (no travelling expenses or similar).

You look for and commission your coach for individual career coaching yourself. The career coaching can be carried out from May 2024 to October 2024 after receiving the funding approval.

This offer is a pilot project of the KHYS Postdoc Office and will initially take place only this year.

Target Group

Postdocs at KIT who would like to take a closer look at their further professional development. You must be a ▶ member of KHYS when registering for the coaching program.

Registration and Procedure

To register for the coaching program, please complete and sign the ▶ registration form and send it to nadine.civilotti∂kit.edu by April 15, 2024.

Places on the program are limited. Registrations will be processed in the order in which they are received on a first come, first served basis. Once your registration has been processed, you will receive feedback from us by e-mail in early to mid-May 2024.

If you receive a funding approval, you will independently look for and commission a coach of your choice. For your guidance, we will supply you with an overview of possible coaching providers together with the funding approval. Coaches should ideally, but do not have to, be selected from this overview. You arrange all coaching appointments individually in consultation with the coach. Usually, free initial meetings are held before the start of a coaching program to determine whether a collaboration makes sense. You will receive further information with the funding approval.

When is Coaching Suitable?

Coaching is suitable as support for specific questions ("How do I deal with a certain situation?", "What are my next steps?"), but also to accompany a process over a certain period of time, for example in situations of transition or to overcome challenges. Coaches do not present any solutions, but offer a space for targeted (self-)reflection and use various methods to support the development of your own work and solution approaches and options for action.

Contact: ▶ Nadine Civilotti

▶ Privacy Policy